---
title: Sui Client PTB CLI
description: The Sui Client PTB CLI enables a user to construct a PTB and execute it from the command line or a file.
keywords: [ client ptb, sui client ptb, programmable transaction block, ptbs, sui cli ptbs, sui ptb cli, ptb cli, execute ptb from cli, execute ptb from file, ptb help ]
---

The `client ptb` command allows you to specify the transactions for execution in a programmable transaction block (PTB) directly from your CLI or through bash scripts.

:::warning

The examples in this document were tested using a `bash` shell environment. Your experience might vary depending on how your shell interprets the input values (for example, zsh requires quotes around passed values in brackets: "[]"; whereas bash accepts them without quotes). On Windows, you might need to add even more quotes around arguments passed (for example, `--assign "forge @<FORGE-ID>"`).

:::

## Commands

The following list itemizes all the available args for the `sui client ptb` command. Use the `--help` for a long help version that includes some examples on how to use this command.

```sh
$ sui client ptb --help
```

<ImportContent source="console-output/sui-client-ptb-help.mdx" mode="snippet" />

## Design philosophy and concepts

The main philosophy behind the CLI PTB support is to enable a user to build and execute a PTB from the command line. Bash scripts can be used to construct and execute the PTB just as you would do from the command line, providing great flexibility when it comes to automating different tasks.

Besides using existing [traditional PTB](/concepts/transactions/prog-txn-blocks/) related concepts, we introduce a few new and important concepts for this command.

:::warning

All the following examples were tested using a `bash` shell environment and your experience may vary depending on how your shell interprets the input values (e.g., zsh requires to pass values in brackets by adding quotes around it: "[]"; bash accepts them without quotes).

:::

### Types

Sometimes, CLI PTBs require that you specify the type of a value or variable. For instance, in the following example you must provide the `<u64>` type when calling the `0x1::option::is_none` function.

```sh
$ sui client ptb \
--assign my_variable none \
--move-call 0x1::option::is_none "<u64>" my_variable \
--gas-budget 50000000
```

To pass in multiple types, delimit them with a comma:

```sh
...
--move-call package::module::function "<u64,u8,u256>" \
...
```

### Strings

CLI PTBs support string literals as inputs, which will be encoded as pure values that can be used as inputs to `vector<u8>`, `std::ascii::String` and `std::string::String` parameters. The following example previews a transaction block that passes the string `"Hello, world"` to a function `m::f` in a package `$PKG` (its ID is held in an environment variable).

```sh
$ sui client ptb --move-call "$PKG::m::f" '"Hello, world"' --gas-budget 10000000 --preview
```

:::warning

Double-quoted string literals tend to also be valid syntax for shells (like `bash`), so when inputting PTBs on the command-line, remember to wrap the entire string in single-quotes so that its double-quotes are interpreted literally, as in the previous example.

:::

### Addresses and Object IDs

<ImportContent source="address-prefix.mdx" mode="snippet" />

Here are some examples for `transfer-objects` and `gas-coin`:

```sh
$ sui client ptb --transfer-objects "[ARRAY_OF_OBJECTS]" @0x02a212de6a9dfa3a69e22387acfbafbb1a9e591bd9d636e7895dcfc8de05f331 --gas-coin @0x00002819ee07a66e53800495ccf5eeade8a02054a2e0827546c70e4b226f0495
```

### Vectors

CLI PTBs support vectors of serializable types as input (which includes all the primitive types, `ID`s, and `Option`s). Vectors are represented as a comma-separated list of values in square brackets prefixed with `vector`.

```sh
$ sui client ptb --move-call "$PKG::m::f" vector[1, 2, 3]
```

Example above illustrates a vector of integer values. Depending on the type of the vector, you can pass any supported type:

```sh
--move-call package::module::function vector[@0x1, @0x2, @0x3] # vector<address>
--move-call package::module::function vector[none, none]       # vector<Option<T>>
--move-call package::module::function vector["1", "2", "3"]    # vector<String>
```

### Option

Options are represented as `none` or `some(value)`. The value can be any supported primitive type, `ID`, or `Option`.

```sh
$ sui client ptb --move-call "0x1::option::destroy_some" some(2)
```

For `none`, you can use the `none` keyword. For `some`, you can use the `some` keyword followed by the value.

```sh
$ sui client ptb --move-call "0x1::option::destroy_none" none
```

### Addresses

### Assign

Use the `--assign` argument to bind values to variables. There are two ways you can use it:

- assign a value to a variable
- assign a variable to the result of the previous command

Let's look at the first case where you assign a value to a variable. You want to check if some variable's value is `none`. Call the `0x1::option::is_none` function from the Move standard library, and pass in the variable name:

```sh
$ sui client ptb \
--assign my_variable none \
--move-call 0x1::option::is_none "<u64>" my_variable \
--gas-budget 50000000
```

:::tip

CLI PTB uses name resolution for common packages like `sui`, `std`, `deepbook`, so you can use them directly instead of their addresses: `0x2`, `0x1`, or `0xdee9`.

:::

In the second case, if a previous command outputs some result, you can bound it to a variable for later access. Let's see an example where you want a new coin with 1000 MIST, which you can achieve by using the `split-coins` command. After you do that, you want to transfer the new coin to another address. Without the `--assign` argument, you couldn't instruct the CLI to transfer that new coin object as you would not have a way to refer to it.

```sh
$ sui client ptb \
--split-coins gas "[1000]" \
--assign coin \
--transfer-objects "[coin]" @recipient_address \
--gas-budget 50000000
```

:::tip

If you build a complex PTB, use the `--preview` flag to display the PTB transaction list instead of executing it.

:::

## Examples

The following examples demonstrate how to use the `client ptb` command.

:::tip

When a PTB is executed, the output contains all the relevant information (transaction data, gas cost, effects, object changes, and so on). Use `--summary` to get a short summary when you do not need all the data. For complex PTBs, you can use `--preview` to display the PTB transaction list instead of executing it.

:::

### Move call

When needing to execute a Move call, use the `--move-call` transaction to call a specific function from a package. The CLI PTB supports name resolution for common packages like `sui`, `std`, `deepbook`, so you can use both `0x1::option::is_none` as well as `std::option::is_none` for passing the function name.

```sh
--assign A none
--move-call std::option::is_none "<u64>" A
```

To call a specific function from a specific package, you can use the following call:

```sh
--move-call PACKAGE_ADDR::MODULE::FUNCTION "<TYPE>" FUNC_ARG1 FUNC_ARG2 ...
```

### Publish

Publishing a package is one of the most important commands you need when working with Sui. While the CLI has a standalone `publish` command, PTBs also support publishing and upgrading packages. One main difference is that with `sui client ptb`, you must explicitly transfer the `UpgradeCap` object that is returned when creating a package, or destroy it with a call to [`make_immutable`](/concepts/sui-move-concepts/packages.mdx). Here is an example on how to publish a Move project on chain using the `sui client ptb` command. It makes a call to the `sui::tx_context::sender` to acquire the sender and assigns the result of that call to the `sender` variable, and then calls the publish command. The result of `publish` is bounded to `upgrade_cap` variable, and then this object is transferred to the sender.

```sh
$ sui client ptb \
--move-call sui::tx_context::sender \
--assign sender \
--publish "." \
--assign upgrade_cap \
--transfer-objects "[upgrade_cap]" sender \
--gas-budget 100000000
```

### Split, destroy, and merge coins

The following example showcases how to split a gas coin into multiple coins, make a move call to destroy one or more of the new coins, and finally merge the coins that were not destroyed back into the gas coin. It also showcases how to use framework name resolution (for example, `sui::coin` instead of `0x2::coin`) and how to refer to different values in an array using the `.` syntax.

```sh
# Split off from gas
--split-coins gas "[0,1,2,3]"
--assign coins
--move-call sui::coin::destroy_zero<sui::sui::SUI> coins.0
# Can further split a split coin (and through variable bindings/result accesses)
--split-coins coins.1 "[0,0]"
--assign zcoins
# Destroy both new coins
--move-call sui::coin::destroy_zero<sui::sui::SUI> zcoins.0
--move-call sui::coin::destroy_zero<sui::sui::SUI> zcoins.1
# Can merge the split coins back
--merge-coins gas "[coins.1, coins.2, coins.3]"
--gas-budget 10000000
```

### Transfer objects

This example creates three new coins from gas and transfers them to a different address.

```sh
--assign to_address @0x02a212de6a9dfa3a69e22387acfbafbb1a9e591bd9d636e7895dcfc8de05f331 \
--split-coins gas "[1,2,3]" \
--assign s \
--transfer-objects "[s.0, s.1, s.2]" to_address \
--gas-budget 10000000
```

:::info

You can also pass an alias (without the '@') instead of an address.

:::

## Reserved words

You cannot use the following words for variable names:

- `address`
- `bool`
- `vector`
- `some`
- `none`
- `gas`
- `u8`
- `u16`
- `u32`
- `u64`
- `u128`
- `u256`

## JSON output

Append the `--json` flag to commands to format responses in JSON instead of the more human-friendly default Sui CLI output. This can be useful for extremely large datasets, for example, as those results can have a troublesome display on smaller screens. In these cases, the `--json` flag is useful.
